


touching hearts

by Russy



Series: touching hearts [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Original Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Anakin Skywalker Doesn't Turn to the Dark Side, Angst, BAMF Ahsoka Tano, Child Luke Skywalker, Childhood Memories, Darth Vader (mentioned) - Freeform, Emperor Anakin Skywalker, Emperor Skywalker, Family, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Father-Son Relationship, Flashbacks, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Good Parent Anakin Skywalker, Hurt/Comfort, Imperial Luke Skywalker, Jedi Ahsoka Tano, Jedi Luke Skywalker, Kinda, Luke Skywalker Needs A Hug, Memories, Mentioned Sheev Palpatine | Darth Sidious, Non-Linear Narrative, Obi-Wan Kenobi (mentioned) - Freeform, Obi-Wan Kenobi is Darth Vader, Parent Anakin Skywalker, Parent-Child Relationship, Prince Luke Skywalker, Single Parent Anakin Skywalker, Sith Obi-Wan Kenobi, Skywalker Family Feels, The Force, Yoda (mentioned) - Freeform, anakin's empire wasn't like palpatine's at all, he actually had a senate he listened to, it was something inbetween the republic and the empire actually, thats why it's called senatorial empire, the galaxy prospered
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-26
Updated: 2020-03-26
Packaged: 2021-02-28 18:47:30
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,487
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23331874
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Russy/pseuds/Russy
Summary: Luke hasn’t seen his father in 10 years, not since Palpatine, whom everyone thought had died, seized power once again.
Relationships: Anakin Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano, Anakin Skywalker & Luke Skywalker, Anakin Skywalker | Darth Vader & Luke Skywalker, Luke Skywalker & Ahsoka Tano
Series: touching hearts [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1682614
Comments: 16
Kudos: 133





	touching hearts

**Author's Note:**

> I'm super soft for dad Anakin, and this AU came into my head fully formed, basically begging to be written. There's some explanation about Anakin's Empire in the tags, which is actaully a combination between the canon Republic and Palpatine's Empire, and it actually worked. Also, Luke is 18 in this, and he and Ahsoka have been with the Rebels for a year or 2, and the Battle of Yavin, confrontation on Bespin and Luke's training with Yoda happened already. Reviews are greatly appreciated.

In the most painful, sorrowful moments of his life, Luke Skywalker always remembers what is perhaps the most heart – wrenching, stinging memory of his childhood; the day he had last seen his father. 

He hadn’t known what was going on at the time, he was supposed to be returning to the palace after his lessons, like he did every day. He walked out of the Academy where one of his father’s aides always waited for him, except this time something was different. There were two guards there, too, his father’s crimson clad royal guards, and the aide ushered him inside the speeder with an urgency he hadn’t ever used before. The guards followed suit, and Luke remembers looking out of the window as they hurried to the palace, abandoning traffic lanes and sliding between buildings. He remembers the noise, and the blaster fire, and a sky full of ships and buildings smoking in the horizon. If he closes his eyes, he can still see the Imperial Senate aflame in the distance, or all the people running around the palace once they got there. They landed in his father’s personal hangar, and Ahsoka was there, hastily putting some bags away on one of Anakin’s ships. She looked pained, fearful even, and that scared Luke, because he had never seen her quite like this before. She spotted him too, and she looked at him sorrowfully for a moment before jerking her gaze towards something behind him. Luke turned around, and his father was there, rushing towards him with another bag in each hand. He knelt down in front of Luke, bringing him close to his chest for a moment and squeezing his middle before pulling away, holding him by the shoulders.

Luke still didn’t quite understand what was going on, but he knew it was bad. Horrible. His father looked frightened, mortified even, and Luke had never seen him like this before.

“Papa? What’s going on?”

“Luke,” his father said, moving his hands to cup his face, “Luke, I want you to listen to me, alright? Something horrible is happening, and it’s very dangerous for you to remain here right now. I want you to go with Ahsoka, ok? She’ll take care of you for some time.”

“But… but why… why aren’t you coming with us?”

Anakin swallowed, and for the slimmest part of a moment he looked like he might cry. “I can’t come with you, Luke. I’m sorry. I have to stay here and fight, to protect you. I’m very sorry, Luke. I never want to leave you, but right now there isn’t a choice.” He started stroking Luke’s hair with his flesh hand, like he always did to calm him down after a nightmare. “I want you to be brave, alright? And listen to Ahsoka, she’ll take good care of you. I might not see you for some time, Luke,” and this time his father’s eyes had started to get glassy as he swallowed thickly again, “but I want you to know that I’ll come for you, when it’s safe. I’ll see you again, little one, alright? I promise. Be brave. I love you very much, baby. I’ll miss you.”

And with that, his father had hugged him to his chest again, setting his chin on top of his golden hair for a moment before pressing a kiss to his forehead. Luke was shaking with cries, he didn’t want to leave, he wanted to go to his room and play with his ships, he wanted his father to chase him around the courtyard as he shrieked with laughter, or to hold him in his lap and tell him stories. 

When Anakin pulled him away, he felt his father wiping the tears from his cheeks with his thumbs, before bombs started going off in the distance. He looked up, and the sky was almost full of ships, raining down fire over Coruscant. Father was already taking Luke to the ship, and he lifted him inside before kissing his forehead again. “I love you, Luke. Be brave. We’ll see each other again, I promise.” And with that, Anakin stepped away and the ramp closed, and Luke cried even harder.

Idly, Luke thinks now, perhaps the reason he remembers that particular memory every time something terrible happens is because it gives him hope. Even now, 10 years later, he still clings to his father’s words, because he knows his father had never, ever lied to him. He knows that his father is alive, that he has been working with the Alliance for years, to restore the Senatorial Empire that ruled before Palpatine took over. He knows he will see him soon now, too, the Force has been whispering for weeks.

Luke remembers how he cried after that day, for weeks on end. He cried himself to sleep every night, clutching the grey bear his father had given him close under his chin. His father, whom he’d only known for a year before reality refolded on itself again. Luke had spent the first 7 years on his life on Tatooine, with his father’s stepbrother and his wife. Anakin hadn’t even known his child had survived birth, he’d thought them to have died with their mother. But then, somehow, somehow he found out and came for Luke. Luke had been told Anakin was dead, too, and he still remembers seeing his father – the Emperor, his awestruck 7 year old self had whispered in his mind – for the first time, he remembers him kneeling in front of him on the hot gritty sand under the twin suns, dressed in black and with a lightsaber hanging on his belt, smiling gently and with eyes just like his own. Luke doesn’t quite remember what was said anymore, but he remembers father opening his arms, Luke receiving his first ever hug. He remembers his father had stroked his hair with his ungloved hand, and he was smelling of linen and something fresh, like mint. 

He holds the next few days after that one very clearly in his mind, too. They spent two days on a warship, and Luke had been amazed at everything he’d seen. He remembers his father entering the quarters they shared and finding Luke sitting with his legs crossed on the floor, grey bear clutched on his lap as he looked out the transparisteel window at the blue swirls of hyperspace. He also remembers arriving on Coruscant, and how strange and incredible everything, including his father, had seemed at first. The only life Luke had known until then was with his aunt and uncle, who were nice enough, he supposed, but neither of them ever really held him or played with him or paid much attention, really. He was expected to be quiet and stay out of the way, and he remembers his uncle shaking him roughly when he had been displeased. His father was wholly different, even though Luke knew he was the Emperor and he probably had a lot of duties to attend to, but he still seemed to have plenty of time for his son. He was always patient and kind and he always asked Luke if he needed anything. He let him hold his hand and gave him hugs and stroked his hair and spoke gently, and he always answered all the questions the boy asked. He bought Luke loads of toys and let him sit on his lap and read him stories, he gave him sweets and tucked him in at night and kissed him on the forehead.

Luke swallows, looking up at the ceiling from inbetween the tangled bedsheets on his bunk and he wonders, longingly, if Anakin would be proud of him now, for becoming a Jedi Knight, a commander, for facing Vader, for destroying the Death Star. He likes to think so, and for a moment he allows himself another memory of his father, this time a few months after meeting him. Luke remembers he had been telling father about some test he’d done well on, in school. It seems galaxies away now, such a small, insignificant, easy thing that it makes him want to cry until he throws up.

“Well done,” father had said with a smile, bending down slightly to lift Luke in his arms, “let’s go get something to eat, hmm? I have a treat for you afterwards.”

He remembers the treat had been some chocolate cupcakes with mountains of frosting on top, and afterwards papa had taken him outside to go feed the ducks from the pond in the gardens. He used to love running around in the gardens and watching the ducks swim about. This time, they had hatchlings too, and his father had said they looked just like him, they were tiny with soft yellow feathers – _“Just like your hair, Luke”, and a hand patted his head_ – and they always seemed to be following their parents around, gliding through the water. 

“My little duckling,” papa had called him, grinning, and he tickled his sides before kissing him on the head.

Luke rolls over on his side, blinking back tears. He thinks about how everyone who knows his father says he is just like him, and he smiles for a moment before swallowing. They have the same dark blonde hair and icy blue eyes and cleft chin, and Luke remembers sitting in a chair in the medical wing after his duel with Vader – _“Obi-Wan Kenobi,” master Yoda had said, sadly, “your father’s mentor, he was. Consumed by the Dark Side he is, now. The friend your father knew, gone, he is.”_ – on Bespin, getting his prosthetic hand fixed in place and thinking, with a teary chuckle, that he was even more like papa now. In that moment, he remembers missing his father perhaps more than ever, especially as he sat cross legged on his bed at night, gently flexing his new, still – aching durasteel fingers and looking at the only picture he had of himself and Anakin. Ahsoka had taken it, it was in the hangar one late afternoon, after his father had taken Luke piloting with him around the planet in one of his shuttles. They were both smiling, and father’s arm was wrapped around Luke’s shoulders.

He still has the picture, it’s one of his most valuable possessions, along with his lightsaber and the medal he had been awarded after shooting down the Death Star and a tunic that had been Anakin’s and still vaguely held an imprint of his minty scent. He keeps the picture safely tucked away between his clothes, and he rarely even takes it out. It’s the only one he has, and he wants to keep it intact because sometimes he fears he might forget his father’s face, and at least he’d have the picture to remember.

Luke cranes his neck towards the chrono mounted on the wall on the other side of the room. He squints his eyes, barely making out the bleary glowing digits that indicated it was just past midnight. He lets out a quiet yawn as he huddles under the blankets and, not for the first time, Luke imagines his father tucking him in again as if he were a child, and he closes his eyes and sighs.

* * *

The next morning, during the debrief he has with High Command before a short reconnaissance mission with a few squad members in a neighboring system, he hears that they may be joining with some more Rebel cells soon, to prepare for the impending confrontations with the Imperial Navy as the war seemed to be dragging closer to an end. Luke had stopped thinking “this is the day” every day some time when he was around 13, not because he no longer believed his father would come, but because he realized it might not bring him anything except that extra gram of disappointment when he went to bed at night, but yet now, right now, as he sits next to Wedge at the end of a long bench in High Command, he can’t help but feel his heart beat louder up his throat as the Force seemed to pulse along with it. 

That evening, as Luke steers his X-Wing to land on base, he notices that the number of ships on the tarmac has already doubled since the morning. He knows General Madine had said it wouldn’t be long before the other cells joined them, but he didn’t think it would be today. It’s just past 1100 hours, and the hangar is almost empty except for the few Red Squadron pilots that have arrived moments before himself. 

Luke guides his Starfighter to the landing pad, and he feels the Force pounding in his chest once more, as it has been doing for weeks, now harder and clearer than ever. He shuts off the engines and he shudders, trying to concentrate on what he would report to High Command, even though he knows that will not come until tomorrow. He takes off his helmet and leaves it on the seat as he jumps down from the cockpit before dispatching Artoo from his hatch behind the pilot’s seat.

By the time Luke emerges from inbetween the rows of closely aligned ships, the rest of his squadron members had already gone to their quarters. The base is quiet at this time of night, and besides the officers on duty, the number of people that are usually buzzing about during the day is significantly decreased. The hangar is eerily quiet, and Luke walks along the yellow – lit walls and frowns as he spots Ahsoka standing some 40 meters away, talking to someone who is mostly obscured by the front of a shuttle. The Force thrums again, like a honey – dipped buzzing in his chest, before Ahsoka sees him too. She grins at him, widely and clearly, before turning her head towards whomever she was speaking to again and saying something, the smile never leaving her face.

Ahsoka moves to the side and the man moves from besides the shuttle. Luke can see him clearly now, and he thinks his heart stops beating for a quarter of a second as he stands there, unable to do anything but stare. His father’s gaze locks onto him, his eyes widening minutely before Luke feels the old, disabled mental link between the two of them snap back to life like the last piece of a puzzle, robust and warm. Before he knows what is happening, his legs start moving on their own, and he runs to papa, who had opened his arms and was smiling widely at him, the scar running through his right brow crinkling. Luke collides with him, still dressed in his orange flight suit, and he buries his face in his father’s shoulder and he laughs and cries, and he feels Anakin hugging him back just as tightly, and Luke feels like he’s 8 years old again.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you guys liked it, I may write someting more in the same verse in the future, because I still have plenty of ideas about child Luke. Reviews and requests are much appreciated. My tumblr is rrusi-writes, if you want to request anything or just to chat.


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